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Are Demographics Destiny?

The 6-ton elephant in the room is wearing a sombrero

Today there is a lot of reflection in Sarah Palin’s Lamestream Media that the demographics of the country have changed and that is what led to His Willardness’ defeat.

This has also lead, rather hysterically and transparently to sudden announcements of evolution on the idea of immigration reform. And if anyone thinks that Hannity is capable of quiet and thoughtful introspection, I have a water-boarding table to sell you.

The issue that Wingnuttia has attached itself to, leech-like, is that they cannot win future electoral contests without having a strong story to tell about Hispanics.

(WaPo) “This chart… illustrate the Republicans’ political problems heading into the 2014 midterm elections as well as the 2016 and even 2020 presidential campaigns.”

Defensively, Wingnuttia points to some of their rising stars: The Tea party darling Ted Cruz, Nevada Governor Brian Sandoval, New Mexico Governor Susana Martinez, and the ever-present Florida Senator Marco Rubio, whose family hales from Cuba, not south of our border. This is actually an important distinction as Cubans who flee to the United States only have to touch the soil to be let in, legally. It’s a unique status, and trust me: the rest of Latin America knows that they are second-class immigrants, so to speak. Also/Too the Spanish spoken by Cubans is not the same as the Spanish spoken in Latin and South America. When he speaks, they know who he is and where he comes from.

Aside from it sounding like tokenism to point to four people as examples of not being prejudiced against a class of people (and not very convincing if you can point to ONLY four people), the point of that matter is that the GOP also has Jan Brewer and hundreds more like her that have made a career out of gaining power by vilifying others, enacting legislation to ask for papers, and arguing only about whether the fence on the southern border should be electrified or manned with machine guns, or both? It’s not exactly the welcome wagon to greet your new best amigos, but Wingnuts are kind of, what is the word? Shy?

I heard a round-table discussion on the radio this morning, and the conservative said, and I kid you not, that he expects that as Latinos assimilate more in American Culture and become richer, that they will “naturally be drawn to the Republican Party,” which does not seem like much of a welcome mat, either. Wingnuttia also has a meme that culturally all Hispanics are naturally conservative people, so you know that they will fit in. You know, just like all blacks are naturally athletic. It’s offensive to look at any demographic as a monolithic block.

“Message: We Care”

As we noted the other day, last Tuesday’s defeat seemed inevitable, a combination of terrible–and offensive–policies combined with bad optics (the audience at the convention was like seeing the Antique White paint chip color swath at Benjamin Moore brought to life), delivered by theocrats, nut jobs, and scolds who claim to want less government (unless you are a slut or a gay person, in which case you will need their permission just to exist) and that everyone who wasn’t already a wingnut was a moocher, just taking stuff away from the beleaguered 1%.

It is not that I think all Republicans are racists, they are not. But I do think that racists are Republicans. Trotting out Rubio is the physical act of saying, “see some of my best friends…” — I don’t think anyone is going to fall for it. So for Hannity and others inside the vast right-wing conspiracy, to suddenly evolve on immigration reform seems like the height of being low.

My friends who work in HR have a very simple rule that they use especially during a hiring exercise: past performance is the best indicator of future performance. If this holds true in politics, the GOP has a real problem on their hands.

The allegations against Allen are said to involve emails between him and Kelley written from 2010 to 2012. Asked if they were of a “sexual nature,” a senior defense official would only say the messages were, “potentially inappropriate and they bare looking into. The Department is currently reviewing between 20,000 and 30,000 (pages of) documents connected to this matter.”

Republicans don’t have a lot of dog whistles aimed at Asians. Asian culture has a lot of very traditional aspects that would be fairly be called socially conservative.

Asian Americans vote Democratic 70%-30%.

The real Republican Party problem is they have to have the ASSHOLES that make anyone slightly different from them feel unwelcome to sit quietly in the back, instead of, oh let’s say… talk on the radio for three hours a day five days a week to an audience of millions.